Lavrov: Russian-Turkish ministerial meeting canceled

Nov 24 2015

Interfax

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Russian Foreign Ministry / Facebook

A meeting between Russian and Turkish ministers was scheduled for Nov. 25

A meeting between the Russian and Turkish foreign ministers originally scheduled for Nov. 25 in Turkey has been canceled because of Tuesday's incident involving a Russian Sukhoi Su-24 aircraft, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said.

"The judgments are extremely clear, the [Russian] president has said bluntly that this cannot but affect Russian-Turkish relations. In this connection, a decision has been made to cancel the meeting that was planned for tomorrow in Istanbul at the level of the Russian and Turkish foreign ministers within the framework of a so-called joint strategic planning council," Lavrov told journalists on Nov. 24.

The Russian Foreign Ministry has issued a recommendation that Russian citizens should refrain from traveling to Turkey for tourism purposes because the terror threat level in Turkey is not lower than in Egypt.

"Our estimate is that the critical mass of terrorist manifestations on Turkish territory is by no means smaller than that in Egypt. In view of this, we, of course, recommend that our citizens should not travel to the Turkish Republic for tourism or any other purposes at this stage," the minister told.